Even as they stood with a cup of coffee in the hand of each, the subject was being carried on with great earnestness.

At last one of Mr. Drummond's nieces approached the piano, at her aunt's request, and struck a few chords.

A sudden pause, and then the rich tones of the singer hushed the scientific controversy. Even those who had no natural appreciation of harmonious sounds were attracted to listen; among these ranked Henry Halford.

To a singer with less confidence the silence would have been fatal, but Edith Longford was not likely to fail from nervousness, and there is nothing so calculated to steady the nerves of a performer in any subject as a perfect knowledge of what he is about.

As the soft melodious tones ceased, Henry Halford contrived to whisper to Miss Armstrong a question, intended to try whether the young girl, whose conversation had so interested him at dinner, could bear the praise of another without jealousy.

During the song he had not been able to resist the attraction of her presence. Although really occupied with the subject of dispute as he entered the room, Henry Halford's quick eye discovered at once the whereabouts of Mr. Armstrong's daughter, and he had gradually moved towards the table where she sat.

"Miss Longford plays and sings well, Miss Armstrong," were the words that made Mary start from a reverie. "I am quite ignorant of music theoretically, and I have no natural taste for the harmonies; but you can tell me whether my opinion is a correct one."

"I, Mr. Halford!" said Mary, recovering herself; "Miss Longford is far beyond me in music. I could not take the liberty of forming a judgment upon her, excepting that I know she sings and plays far better than I do."

"Generous and candid," said the young man to himself as a gentleman advanced to lead Mary to the piano. He followed them, and stood listening with surprise to the simple English ballad which Mary sang with real taste and feeling.

Henry Halford when alone in his room that night made a decision in his own mind on certain points; in some of these, had he remained firm and unshaken, our story would have ended here.

"Mary Armstrong is a very beautiful girl," were his first mental words, "full of intellectual knowledge, far beyond any young lady I have ever met. She is candid, plain-speaking, impervious to flattery, and generous to a rival--at least if Miss Longford is a rival. For my part, I consider Miss Armstrong's music far more pleasing. And then what a talented man her father is! no wonder, with such a teacher, his daughter should be so different from other girls. I have met many girls, but none like Miss Armstrong."

By a strange a.s.sociation of ideas, to which we are all subject, Easter and Oxford presented themselves to his mind, and the involuntary sigh that followed a recollection of the fact that in less than a week he should be miles away from Mary Armstrong, changed the whole current of his thoughts.

"How absurdly I am allowing my mind to dwell upon this young lady!" he said to himself. "A man so rich as her father will of course wish her to marry a man of wealth, and one equal in position to her mother's relations. I might lay claim to the latter qualification, but what shall I be at the end of my three years at Oxford? an usher in my father's school, or a curate with an income of perhaps 100_l._ a year or less. I will think of her no more!"

CHAPTER XIV.

AN UNEXPECTED JOURNEY.

Whatever impression might have been made by Mr. Henry Halford's cleverness on the mind of Mary Armstrong was destined to be obliterated by the most unlooked-for occurrence.

One evening, about a fortnight after Easter, Mr. Armstrong returned at an unusually early hour, and entered the library, where Mary and her mother were seated, with a look of anxiety on his face which surprised them both.

He held a letter in his hand, and his wife asked nervously--

"What is the matter, Edward? you have no bad news about the boys, I hope."

"No, no," he said hastily, "but I have had a letter from John Armstrong; my poor father, he says, is sinking fast, and wishes to see me once more."

"Oh, papa, when are you going?" cried Mary, "can I pack your carpet bag, or prepare anything for you? I suppose you will go this evening?"

"I should have gone direct from London, after sending you a telegram,"

he replied, "but my father wishes me to bring Mary; have you any objection, my dear?" he added, turning to his wife.

"No, indeed," she replied, "take her with you by all means; I remember how pleased the dear old gentleman was with his little granddaughter when we paid him a visit fifteen years ago."

Mary, who had risen when she offered to a.s.sist in preparing for her father's hasty departure, stood still during this conversation in silent astonishment. Rapid thoughts pa.s.sed through her mind. Was she really going to see the dear old grandfather, of whom she had so often heard her mother speak, and beautiful Meadow Farm, the home of her father's childhood, and the house in which he was born?

So bewildered did she feel at the sudden news, that her mother had to say--

"Do you not wish to accompany your father, Mary?"

"Oh yes, yes, mamma, but it seems too good to be true."

"You must be quick, Mary, if you wish to go," said her father, looking at his watch; "I have ordered James to have the brougham at the door by half-past three, and the train starts from Waterloo at 4.30."

In a moment all was bustle and excitement. Slight refreshment was quickly prepared for the travellers. But Mary had still her useful fairies at her elbow, and when her father summoned her from the dining-room at the time appointed, she only detained him one moment to cling to her mother's neck and kiss her fondly.

Mrs. Armstrong stood at the door to see them off and wish them _bon voyage_. Then she returned to the library to rest after the hurried excitement, which fatigued her even more than a long walk.

This hasty summons which her husband had received carried her memory back to those early days of her married life when with her husband and her little daughter Mary, she had visited Mr. Armstrong's paternal home.

She recalled the sweet country landscape, the apple-orchards in full blossom, the fragrant hayfields, the leafy woods surrounding Meadow Farm, then redolent with the delights of early summer.

She saw and heard again, in imagination, the crowing of c.o.c.ks, the clucking of hens, the chirping chicks and lowing cattle, and the occasional "quack, quack" of ducks and geese, all of which sights and sounds greeted eye and ear from her bedroom window when she rose in the morning.

Even the journey by the old-fashioned stage-coach was not without interest; and how well she remembered the pride of her mother's heart as her little Mary, then scarcely three years old, excited the astonishment of the pa.s.sengers by spelling from the coach window the letters upside down, which formed the name of the coach proprietor!

Again she recalled their amus.e.m.e.nt at one of Mary's childlike speeches, when they stopped to change horses on the road. Across the inn yard came a man with a wooden leg, carrying a pail of water. The child, who had never before seen this subst.i.tute for a human limb, almost screamed with excitement as she exclaimed--

"Oh, mamma, mamma, do look; there's a man with one leg, and a piece of stick for another!"

Even now she could smile at the memory of the child's remark, but it was soon lost as her thoughts turned to the time when she stood in the old hall at Meadow Farm to receive the welcome of her husband's father, a tall, n.o.ble-looking man, one of the olden times, whose dark eyes at the age of sixty-seven had not lost their sparkling intelligence. These eyes, with eyelashes and brows equally dark, contrasted pleasantly with the silvery white hair; and the face with its winter-apple colour, though bronzed by constant exposure to the weather, wore a refined dignity of which his son Edward could scarcely boast. The welcome awarded by this fine old yeoman to his son's wife had a mixture of deference and affection which deeply gratified the well-born daughter of the St. Clairs, and her father-in-law's love for his little fairy grandchild completely won her heart.

All this Mrs. Armstrong had described to Mary so vividly, that the young girl felt as if she already knew every nook and cranny of the old farm, as well as the face of the dear old gentleman who was her father's father. And yet she had not the slightest recollection of the visit so clearly remembered by her mother.

Since that time Mr. Armstrong had more than once paid a visit to his paternal home, but delicate health and an increasing family prevented his wife from accompanying him, yet he never offered to take Mary. Once her mother had proposed to him to do so, but he repudiated the idea.

"No, Maria dear," he had said, "there are no women at Meadow Farm, or in the neighbourhood, who are fit a.s.sociates for your daughter. By-and-by, when her manners are more formed, I shall have no objection."

But Mrs. Armstrong was not deceived by these excuses; she knew that as her husband's income increased, so did his pride. For eccentric persons are always inconsistent, and his strange notions about his daughter's education, and his refusal to allow her to ride on horseback after a certain hour, with other objections to practices which he called "aping the gentry," all arose from "the pride that apes humility."

Meanwhile, quite unaware of her mother's reflections or her father's opinions, Mary seated herself in a first-cla.s.s carriage, her happiness in the prospect of the coming journey only clouded by the fact that her aged grandfather was approaching the borders of the grave.

They were alone in the carriage as far as Slough, and as the express train sped on the consciousness of this made her so uneasy that she could not help breaking the silence by saying--

"Papa, do you think my grandfather will remember me?"

"I think not, my daughter," he replied; "you were scarcely three years old when he saw you last, and now you are a woman."

"But I do hope he will be well enough to know who I am," she said. "I have heard mamma talk of grandpapa so often that I feel sure I shall recognise him when I see him, from her description."

"Your mother does talk to you, then, about her visit to Meadow Farm?"

"Yes, papa, often, and she says grandpapa was a fine, handsome old man when she saw him fifteen years ago."